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1.5.15

Last night, Joseph woke up shortly after I'd fed him his night-time feed. He was upset and disturbed so I slowly picked him up and placed him in to bed with me. Holding him in my arms, I stared at him as he drifted off back to sleep. Just mesmerised in his love as he reached out and grasped my hand with his tiny little fingers, studying his face so that I could remember it forever.

Knowing that today was coming and what that signified, made me just want to hold him even tighter for that little bit longer.

Today is a big day for us. Today is the day that my husband goes for a vasectomy. Even though this day has been coming for a while now, it hasn't stopped me feeling emotional today. My mindset has changed with this baby. As I watch him grow and bond with his brothers, learn to walk, talk, his first tooth, all of his firsts are the lasts for me.

You see, I love children. I love having a baby and, would have loads if I could but realistically, we had to think about us and our family, about how we could cope, and in conclusion, financially we can't afford any more children, emotionally we can't and due to health reasons, this was the last nail in the coffin when it came to making this decision.

Pregnancy makes me ill, ridiculously ill, to the point where I cannot work or even eat and this means that I am no good to my kids whilst going through it. I let them down and cannot do anything that we have planned. So we made this decision together, based on everything, that 3 children was our limit.

Since Joseph was born, I have been different, motherhood seems different. I'm no longer impatient in wanting him to grow up quick. waiting for the milestones to show how he's developing, and instead I'm desperately wanting to slow down time so that I can focus more and be in these moments for just that little bit longer.

Worrying that one day, he'll be older and wont want to cuddle mummy quite as much, so take every opportunity to have him snuggled in my arms. Letting him drift off to sleep on me and just gripping to these moments so I don't lose them. With my first child, I followed all the advice, not holding him for too long, not picking him up straight away when he cried, parenting the ways the books told me to, afraid that letting him be any different would be spoiling him. But you know what, doing what you think is right as a mother is not spoiling them.

I've become such much more aware of the time and how fast it goes. Not wanting to admit that I no longer have a newborn baby, I still have all his clothing, waiting for me to be ready to send them off to be made in to his own little plush toy made from his very own newborn clothing. But how, how can he be nearly 3 month old. It seems like time is passing even faster than before and so I am now taking every moment I can to slow down and just be there, in that moment.

And you know that stuff, those things that you would usually want to get done straight away, those things can wait. The dishes in the sink can wait, it doesn't matter if they stay there over night, having fun and spending time with my children is the most important thing and from now on, I will be making sure I try my damnedest to slow down the time and just take in each moment, knowing that this is the last time that any of these firsts will happen for me.